Hopefully the exodus from Reddit will help drown out the authoritarian-worship here.

Yes, my Russian-sympathizing friends. You can certainly classify the actions of Russia and China as imperialist & bad too, and it will not detract from the imperialist & bad stuff the US or "the West" has done. Most humans can walk and chew gum at the same time, you can too!

It's shit like this that makes this one of the hardest wars to follow. Before that, it was Syria.

The Russian commanders, who were wrong to invade, have learned a lot since the initial invasion. It's the same reason that Assads army was much better after they lost a lot of their soldiers. When you have a lot of your army die, on average, the ones remaining are the ones who managed to stay alive who, again on average, are now much more experienced combat troops.

The Russians did exactly what Ukraine did during the Russian offensive. They pulled back behind their minefields, and then used artillery to drop more mines on the assaulting force that was in the process of clearing mines. This was the same tactic that the Ukrainians used to great success that caused a bunch of Russian tanks to be blown up in columns in Vulhedar.

Remember, good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people. If the basis of your view of why you think a given side is losing is because you don't like them, then you aren't actually interested in the war. Just in cheerleading your team.

Honestly, I can't understand the strategic goal of how the Ukrainians are running this particular offensive. It truly seems to be to spend as much Ukrainian blood to secure western financial and logistical support. Not to actually gain territory they can hold. At least, that's my best guess with articles like this in the American media: Politico

I understand we're you're coming from but I think that's a wrong way to look at it. The villages and towns rarely are equal in the face of front-line activities - some offer great defense opportunities and can be held for months. Most are strategically unimportant and their freedom is reclaimed by battles fought in other locations. History books are full of small town names that have witnessed grand battles and sometimes a victory over a small patch of land can translate to a much greater victory later on.

Edit: typo

I think it's what you said, it is not continuous speed. The offensive may slow down, may accelerate - let's be honest, there is even the chance of failure. However, looking at the last 6-9 months, we should be optimistic. The recapture of a small village may not seem impactful, for people who were born there, lived there until the war or even still live there under Russian oppression - it means the world to them.

Just remember how Kharkiv oblast was liberated in September 2022. Ukraine made some progress in the weeks before, which put enough pressure on the Russian occupiers to make the continued occupation untenable, so they had to pull back into Luhansk.

Something similar could easily happen here, all it needs is a cirumvention of the defense fortifications to push far enough to disrupt e.g. the supply lines between Donetsk and Crimea, and significant parts of the occupation could crumble quickly.

Ukraine will need to push through the first and second lines of defense, where the Russians are extremely dug in. Once they breech those fortifications it should become like driving a scalpel through Russian defenses.

If they manage to go through the first lines of defense, they'll operationally encircle a lot of Russian positions on the west, either prompting the Russian forces to retreat or get trapped in the pocket.

TL;DR this is the hard part